Nadastrom, Salva, Sinden

Nadastrom

When the beat drops at a Nadastrom show, you better have your hands up. Dave Nada is known to stage dive while his DJ partner Matt Nordstrom squeezes the duo's most riotous beats through the speakers. It's a reminder Nadastrom aren't just pushing 21st century dance music toward the edge – they're jumping off it.

The D.C.-born, L.A.-based duo of DJ-producers come from different backgrounds, but share a ravenous appetite for extremes. As the prime architects of Moombahton – a sound Nada invented on the fly at a basement party by slowing Dutch house music down to the tempo of reggaeton – the duo have been praised in the pages of Spin and Rolling Stone, pumped on the airwaves of BBC Radio 1 and NPR, and revered at nightclubs and festivals across the planet.

Nada was born in Maryland, a first generation Ecuadorian American surrounded by five brothers and the sounds of cumbia, Ecuadorian folk, salsa, merengue and reggaeton. As a teen, he gravitated toward Washington's legendary hardcore punk scene, playing in bands while learning to DJ on college radio. A move to Baltimore landed Nada in the second surge of Baltimore club music, where he DJed alongside club icons K-Swift, Rod Lee and DJ Technics, while producing acclaimed club tracks of his own.

Nordstrom grew up in Virginia on the other side of the Washington beltway where skateboarding provided a contact point with punk, metal and hip-hop. In the late '90s, he swapped the skateboard for turntables and switched his college major from psychology to audio engineering. Soon, Nordstrom was the resident engineer for esteemed D.C. house heroes Deep Dish and piloting recording sessions with the likes of Stevie Nicks and P. Diddy, even scoring a Grammy nod along the way.

When Nada and Nordstrom came together in 2007, the chemistry was instant and the music was colossal. The group signed to Switch's Dubsided label where their debut debut EP, "Pussy," immediately topped the charts on Beatport. Since then, Nadastrom have produced tracks for a slew of artists, including Kid Sister, and have done remixes for Kid Cudi, Benny Benassi, Christina Aguilera, Waka Flocka Flame, the Death Set and Alex Clare.

In 2010, the duo relocated from Washington to Los Angeles and hit the road, performing at the biggest festivals in dance music, including Australia's Creamfields festival with Deadmau5, the Disco Biscuits' Camp Bisco festival, Bass Island with Bassnectar, the Mad Decent Block Party with Major Lazer and the HARD Festival in Los Angeles with Ducksauce, Chromeo, BoysNoize and Odd Future. This fall, Nadastrom joins Skrillex and 12th Planet for more than 50 nights on the hotly anticipated Mothership Tour.

Meantime, Moombahton has become a movement of its own, with Nadastrom serving as the genre's leading ambassadors. Diplo's Mad Decent label dropped the acclaimed compilation "Dave Nada presents Blow Your Head Vol. 2: Moombahton" in May and Scion released Nadastrom's Moombahton EP "El Baile Diabluma" this fall.

"There are never any rules," says Nada of the duo's approach. "And Moombahton helped us realize that even more."

Salva

A versatile solo producer, crowd riling DJ, owner of the revered Frite Nite label (B. Bravo, Eprom, Ana Sia) and key figure in the Friends of Friends collective, Paul Salva knows how to control a room. After dropping one of 2012's biggest tracks, a collaborative remix of Kanye West's "Mercy" that not only reached #1 on Soundcloud, but received spins on Power 106 FM (LA), Power 105 FM (NYC), and Shade45XM, Salva's work promotes complexity through a synthesis of contrasting styles, showcasing dips into house motifs, grooves in smooth boogie funk, and massive roiling bass waves that has garnered support from the likes of Pitchfork, FADER, FACT, BBC's Benji B and Skream & Benga, A-Trak, Low End Theory, Snoop Dogg, Diplo, Dâm-Funk, Night Slugs, and many others.

A Chicago native who developed his craft in San Francisco and currently resides in Los Angeles, Salva has been invited to perform on the world's biggest stages. A 2011 alum of the Red Bull Music Academy, 2012 has seen Salva perform at Sonar, Coachella, Lollapalooza, Mutek Montreal, Detroit Electronic Music Festival, SXSW, The Do Over LA, Low End Theory, Brooklyn Electronic Music Festival and many others, while touring alongside Nguzunguzu, Shlohmo, Pearson Sound, and B2Bs with Machinedrum.

Aside from his live performances, Salva hones his production talents as one of the cornerstones of the Friends of Friends label alongside Shlohmo, Mexicans With Guns and Groundislava. His 2011 debut full-length, 'Complex Housing' and 'Yellobone' EP both received critical acclaim (Pitchfork, FADER, FACT, and others), leading him to exclusive mixes for Mary Anne Hobbs, The FADER, and XLR8R, while being asked to remix the likes of Miguel Migs, Glitch Mob, Rainbow Arabia, Om Unit and others.

As label owner, Salva has seen his Frite Nite imprint emerge as one of North America's premier sources of West Coast electronic bass music, exploring all corners of the electronic soundscape and harnessing diversity to produce compositions that transcend genre boundaries.

'Yellobone' EP available now on Friends of Friends Music.

Sinden

Earlier this year, UK bass icon Sinden launched his own record label, Grizzly. The label's discography is only a few releases deep—the most recent being WAFA's "Ewid Disco" 12"—but it's quickly become clear that Sinden's A&R acumen is as potent as his talent for crafting high-quality radio broadcasts, not to mention his top-notch DJ and production skills. Speaking of the latter, he's also got the debut album from The Count & Sinden which came out in September, not to mention plenty more Grizzly releases and his usual spate of DJ gigs around the globe.